


The Seduction of John Childermass

by inkblot_fiend



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (TV), Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: Bisexual Jonathan, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2015-08-29
Packaged: 2018-04-17 23:09:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4684757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkblot_fiend/pseuds/inkblot_fiend
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It was a rare game they played, this, and made all the more exciting by its infrequent occurrence."</p>
<p>Arabella sets Jonathan a challenge which he accepts with gusto.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Seduction of John Childermass

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Somethin-strange](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Somethin-strange).



> Written for somethin-strange as part of the JS&MN Auction House. Enjoy!

“A guinea,” said Arabella, “And two nights at the opera. _Different_ operas. That is my wager, that you cannot seduce that fellow within a fortnight.”

“My darling Bell,” Jonathan said as he swept up her hand and kissed her knuckles, “I shall have him within a week.”

It was a rare game they played, this, and made all the more exciting by its infrequent occurrence. Arabella was, in fact, on a winning streak, as the previous two gentlemen she had named for him had rebuffed his advances most emphatically. This was also a new variation, for Arabella had never previously named a servant as the object of Jonathan's approach.

Then again, Childermass was not much like any ordinary servant. Jonathan found his gaze frequently drawn to him, found him fascinating to observe. His habit of leaning on walls and draping himself on furniture in the presence of gentlemen was wonderfully insolent. The ease with which he interjected his own opinions into conversation was delightfully rude. The thought of prissy Mr Norrell employing such a scruffy and altogether disreputable man to fulfil the role of manservant and general aide was utterly charming, and Jonathan could not help but speculate on their relationship.

It was his conclusion, some months into his apprenticeship, that Childermass was not really a servant at all, not in the traditional sense. Norrell relied on him more as an extension of himself, as if all of his more forceful personality traits (his courage, his guile, his determination, even, perhaps his sense of humour) had been siphoned off and forged into this shadier creature. Childermass did not bring tea, though he would ring for it. Childermass would open the door to visitors, greeting and turning away callers as he saw fit. He once informed Jonathan on the steps of the house that Mr Norrell had a headache and would receive no-one that day, and closed the door in his face with a smart snap. Jonathan could not help but smile.

Childermass had dirty hands but was permitted to touch the books. Childermass had wild hair but was not made to wear a wig. Childermass would sometimes go about in his shirtsleeves and none in the household so much as looked at him askance. It was, Jonathan concluded, perhaps a form of magic, that Childermass had so enthralled Norrell and his more respectable staff.

And this was the man Arabella wished him to seduce. Jonathan could barely contain himself.

It began on the Monday (having kissed Arabella good-bye in a very lingering fashion) with a subtle increase in his glances at Childermass, who was sitting in his usual desk in the library, scratching away at a ledger of some kind whilst Norrell lectured rather enthusiastically on the subject of water-based magic. Jonathan marked how the sun caught in his hair and caused it to blaze brightly, and how the gentle frown of concentration upon his face leant him a certain scholarly intensity.

On the Tuesday he contrived to linger with Childermass in the hall and _accidentally_ brushed their hands together as Childermass helped him into his coat. When Childermass showed him to the door he touched his hat to Childermass and smiled widely.

On the Wednesday he noted that he was the recipient of more than a few quick looks from Childermass, each of them curious though perhaps somewhat guarded. In the late afternoon Jonathan met one of these looks, locking eyes with Childermass across the library when Norrell was engrossed in writing up some notes from their most recent discussion. There was a brief crackle of understanding between them, during which Childermass' eyes widened and Jonathan smiled and touched his bottom lip with the tip of his tongue, and then Norrell looked back up from his papers and made some remark and the moment was gone.

Thursday brought its own challenge, as Norrell had declared himself too tired to teach and had instead invited Jonathan to choose a book and read quietly whilst Norrell did the same. It was a rare opportunity, to be sure, but he found himself frequently distracted by Childermass, who was dusting. Jonathan had never considered dusting to be an alluring activity before, but then he had never watched Childermass strip off his jacket, roll up his sleeves and do his work. He reached and leaned and flexed his forearms in what seemed like a very deliberate fashion, making a very pretty show of himself.

Seeing that Norrell was so deeply immersed in his reading (Jonathan sometimes fancied that the Raven King himself would go unnoticed if Norrell happened to be reading at the time of his reappearance) Jonathan took the liberty of watching Childermass, noting with some interest the lines of his body and the evidence of muscle under his stockings. He was just beginning to consider how those legs might look naked, perhaps spread wide or else thrown over Jonathan's shoulders, when he realised that the man he was appraising had stopped in his work and was tapping his duster against one of his aforementioned legs.

Jonathan slowly looked up. Childermass was not smiling, though there was a light in his eyes that suggested he was not upset. He glanced at Norrell, whose head was still firmly buried in his book, then back at Jonathan. He winked.

Jonathan's mouth went dry and his heart accelerated to a frantic speed. He felt very keenly that Childermass had just snatched the reins from him, rendering him a passenger in this endeavour. Before anything could come of it, however, Norrell stirred and the spell was broken. Childermass turned his back (so of course Strange made a quick inspection of his backside, discovering it was very pleasing indeed) and resumed his work as Norrell began to expound on the inadequacies of whatever thing he had been reading.

By Friday Jonathan thought he deserved some kind of commendation for keeping up with Norrell in a loud and relatively boisterous discussion on the role of faeries in healing magic whilst he could plainly see Childermass stretching his cricked neck and then chewing on his thumb whilst he read over his accounts.

At luncheon he was very aware of Childermass' scent (a rich sort of tobacco and something like nutmeg) and decided that he could stand it no longer. He was granted a bit of good fortune when Norrell announced that he would like to set Jonathan a piece of translation and put him in a small drawing room with a desk and the obscure text in question. On any other day Jonathan would have protested that he was an apprentice, not a schoolboy, but he saw the slight flicker of heat pass over Childermass' face and decided that he would, on this one occasion, permit it.

“Perhaps,” Jonathan suggested, “You might leave me Childermass, in case I should have a need of some other reference materials. I would not like to disturb you in your business.”

Norrell looked briefly conflicted, then looked past Jonathan to Childermass. Jonathan did not see his reaction, but the result was that Norrell nodded, wished him well and vacated the room.

“I suppose you will now tell me, sir,” began Childermass, who was leaning against the door with his hands behind his back and one leg hooked in front of the other, “What you have been about this past week.”

Jonathan took in the whole sight of him and smiled. He left his little desk and stopped only a foot short of Childermass.

“I see,” Childermass said, cocking his head slightly to one side. “I must tell you that this door has no lock. And that Norrell is likely to want to check on your progress as soon as he thinks it decent.”

“Then I suppose we must be quiet,” Jonathan said, and when Childermass smirked he closed the distance between them and kissed him.

Childermass made a happy sort of growl and sunk his hands into Jonathan's hair, turning his head just so and biting at his lower lip. Jonathan whimpered and Childermass took the liberty of sliding his tongue inwards and silencing Jonathan with the filthiest kiss he could remember receiving. It was wet and breathless and Jonathan's prick, which had shown a certain interest at the mere prospect of being alone with Childermass, was by now tenting his breeches quite obscenely. He was about to suggest that they move their activities to the nearby chaise longue when Childermass took hold of him by his jacket and spun him so their positions were reversed.

“You,” Childermass snarled, pressing himself up against the full length of Jonathan's body, “You have been watching me. Is this what you wanted from me, sir?”

“To begin with,” Jonathan said. He wrapped his arms around Childermass, slipping his hands under his jacket and caressing his back.

Childermass resumed kissing him with such a ferocity that for a time Jonathan forgot he was meant to be the seducer, he was meant to be bending Childermass to his will; and yet here he was, helpless even as Childermass yanked open his neckcloth and began sucking a mark onto his neck.

“Oh!”

“Not to your liking?” Childermass laid his hand on Jonathan's shoulder and pressed his thumb into the fresh bruise. The resulting pain shot right down to his groin.

He took Childermass by the back of the head and guided him back for another of those violent kisses and with his other hand cupped the back of his breeches, feeling out his firm behind. Childermass groaned into his mouth.

“You say we do not have much time,” Jonathan said, fighting a little for breath.

Childermass nodded. “He will not want to be away from you for long, sir.”

With that Childermass rubbed the front of Jonathan's breeches, drawing a heated sigh from his throat and an involuntary thrust from his hips. His fingers found the buttons with impressive precision and he slid them open, teasing Jonathan's mouth with his tongue at the same time. When the placket fell open he slid his hand inside, palming Jonathan's aching cock. Jonathan arched off the door, pushing himself into that hand and biting down hard on his lip to keep from shouting.

“Oh, what I would do to you,” Childermass said. He made a loose fist around Jonathan and set a torturous sort of pace. “I would have you begging me for it, begging me to take you.”

Jonathan nodded, whimpering, and fumbled at Childermass' breeches, his hands moving to touch and rub whatever they could, seeking out heat and likely achieving little of use.

“Would you like that, sir? Perhaps in the library, bent over my desk.”

He closed his eyes and he could see it. “Yes,” he gasped into the air, which had grown damp and hot between them, “Please!”

Childermass withdrew his hand (and Jonathan most certainly did not whine at the loss) and got his own breeches open. He grabbed one of Jonathan's hands and brought it up to his mouth. He waited until Jonathan was staring at him, wide-eyed and panting, then licked a broad stripe up his palm. He did it again, and again until the skin was nicely wet. With a most wicked smile he guided Jonathan's hand down into his breeches.

“Oh, yes,” Jonathan sighed, and wrapped his fingers around Childermass' cock, which was a very happy handful indeed. For a moment he thought Childermass meant to guide him, but when he took up a competent and pleasurable rhythm Childermass' face went slack, then creased into an expression of pained enjoyment.

“Did you think me, ah! Did you think me virginal in these matters, Childermass?” Jonathan said through gasps and gritted teeth.

“I am pleased to be wrong,” said Childermass, and with that he returned his own hand to Jonathan.

They stroked and kissed and gasped together, and Jonathan thought this might be the single most scandalous moment of his entire life, and that Arabella would have to do without the opera for a very long time _indeed_ , because he had most definitely won the wager. And then Childermass rubbed his thumb over the very tip of Jonathan's prick and all thoughts and wonderings went right out of his head and were replaced by a distilled feeling of _want_. He kissed blindly, seeking only contact, and squeezed his hand tightly, seeking reciprocation. Childermass was, of course, a very clever fellow and caught on almost immediately. It was not, therefore, very much longer before Jonathan felt himself pull suddenly taut. He had to bury his face in Childermass' shoulder (perhaps biting down on the abundance of fabric there) to muffle his shout as he found his release.

Childermass made a low noise as he eased Jonathan through his trembling. Their mouths were pressed together, not so much to kiss, now, as to simply be close. Childermass moved his hand, slick with Jonathan's emission, to help bring himself off, which he achieved as Jonathan kissed him on his jaw, his chin, his rough cheek.

There was a silence. The air around them was thick and Jonathan's knees felt very weak. He was glad to be leaning against the door.

Childermass produced a clean handkerchief from his jacket and cleaned first Jonathan and then himself in a very efficient manner, which Jonathan complimented him on in rather a dazed voice.

“I do my best, sir,” Childermass said with a crooked smile.

It was at this moment that there came a knocking at the door and an anxious voice said, “How are you finding it, Mr Strange?”

The very next moment involved a lot of hasty reassembly, which Childermass completed first before correcting Jonathan's hair with a quick sweep of his hand.

“I do very poorly!” called Jonathan as Childermass opened the door. “I am a poor scholar indeed, sir, for I can make nothing of it.”

“Oh, tosh,” said Norrell as he bustled in, a stack of books in his arms. “It is no simple task that I have set you, but one which will yield significant rewards. Now, you did not send Childermass to collect any books, so I took the liberty of assembling an introductory reading list which I am sure you will find most instructive.”

As Norrell continued in this vein (mercifully not noticing that Jonathan had failed to lay a single mark on the page) Jonathan looked over his head to where Childermass was leaning beside the door. They met each other's gaze and Childermas made a small shrugging gesture that seemed to convey worlds of meaning that Jonathan Strange, poor scholar that he was, could not quite interpret.

 

He returned his focus to Norrell, and as such did not notice Childermass leave the room. All the rest of the day he felt as if he had been cut loose from the world, as if he should laugh and dance and invite the whole of humanity to do the same. He kept this feeling tied up inside him until he could at last go home and sweep his wife up in his arms.

“My sweet Bell,” he said as he held her close, “You have lost your bet. I would say I am sorry for it but you know how much I detest the opera. And I do not think even you shall be sorry, for I have a very pretty story to tell, if you would care to hear it.”

She laughed, sweet and light, and led him to their bedroom by the hand.

 


End file.
